


The Atrocity

by Breathesgirl



Series: Slytherin Cabal [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: M/M, obliviate
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-20
Updated: 2018-04-20
Packaged: 2019-04-25 08:58:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14375409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Breathesgirl/pseuds/Breathesgirl
Summary: A Slytherin and a Gryffindor witness something atrocious. How will Obliviate help them?





	The Atrocity

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by [TheSlytherinCabal](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSlytherinCabal/pseuds/TheSlytherinCabal) in the [DBQ2018Round1](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/DBQ2018Round1) collection. 



> There's nothing quite so challenging as a pairing you've never read or written before.

“Seriously Dude!”

“I am not your dude!”

Dean ignored the slightly irate, and more than a little green around the gills, Slytherin as they ran through the corridors to escape what they’d just seen.

“Did you see...” he started to ask as they skidded around a corner.

“Yes,” Blaise hissed, out of breath, “would you stop mentioning it? I’m trying to forget what I saw!”

“I know mate; I want to tear my eyeballs out too!”

“I am not your mate, Thomas!” Blaise stated quite firmly.

“Maybe not, but will you help me find a way to erase this from my mind? I can’t stand to see...that...what they...urggggghh!”

Zabini smirked. He knew the spell, just not how to perform it. Plus making a Gryffindork forget something extra would be rather entertaining. He nodded, knowing just where to find the book which would explain the Obliviate charm and how to perform it.

Blaise and Dean went their separate ways to their common rooms—Dean to pull out his charms books and see if there was anything on memory charms in them. Blaise off to scour the bookshelves in the dungeon, looking for the book he had added himself back in first year.

Dean spent some time looking through his charms books for anything having to do with memory charms, but was unsuccessful. Maybe one of the professors would know? He shook his head at his own thoughts; he didn’t want to  **think**  about what he’d seen, let alone explain it to someone else! He finally gave it up as a lost cause and went to bed where he fell into a fitful sleep.

Several hours later he woke in a cold sweat with the memory of what he’d seen in that dungeon classroom at the forefront of his mind. He shuddered and shook his head, trying to clear it, but it was no use, and now his night clothes were soaked through, so he got his toiletries together and took a hot shower to help clear his mind.

As he was leaving the shower, Harry was entering, looking as rumpled and sleep deprived as Dean had felt before his shower. “You okay there Harry?” He asked as he gathered up his wet towel and toiletries.

Harry nodded, not very convincingly, “Yeah,” he yawned and stretched, “just had another bad dream, nothing to worry about.”

Dean nodded, “I know what you mean, but I can’t go back to sleep. Not now.” His eyes widened, and he shuddered as he thought about what he’d seen the night before.

“You want to talk about it?” Harry asked, concerned.

Dean shook his head, “Nah mate. It’s too horrible to talk about,” he shuddered again at the thought.

“You sure? Hermione says it’s always better when you can talk about it in the bright light of day.”

Dean looked through the door at the window opposite, then back at Harry, “It’s not quite daytime Harry.”

Harry smiled, “You know what I mean though Dean. Anyway, the offer is open if you want to talk about it.”

Dean gave a little smile in thanks. “It’s too horrible to contemplate Harry. I saw something in the dungeons last night...” he shuddered and shook his head hard, trying to shake the thoughts out so he wouldn’t see it again.

Harry’s interest was piqued, “Something in the dungeons you say? Anything to do with our  _favourite_ Slytherins?”

Dean laughed, feeling better already, “Favourite? I didn’t know we had any favourite Slytherins.”

Harry groaned, “Sarcasm Dean, sar-ca-sm. You know, using irony to convey contempt?”

“Apparently you don’t know it when you hear it, Potter,” Dean said with a smirk. “But no, it had nothing to do with Slytherins, favourite or otherwise. It had to do with...” he stopped and considered what he was going to say. Finally, he leaned forward and whispered what he’d seen in Harry’s ear.

“Seriously?” Harry screeched, then cringed, hoping he didn’t wake any of their dorm mates. He heard one of them snort quietly in his sleep, but no one actually woke up. “You saw...them doing that... to each other?” He shuddered, “That’s just...ewwww.”

“I know mate, that’s why I had the nightmare. I kept seeing it over and over in my dreams. But it seems Hermione’s right, talking about it helped some. Do you need to talk? See if it’ll help you?”

Harry shook his head, “Nah, thanks though. It’s just more of the same that I’ve had most of my life. I just want to take a shower to wash off the sweat; then I’ll probably head down to breakfast.”

Dean nodded, “That’s cool. I’ll see you in the common room in a bit then?” He asked.

Harry nodded and turned toward the shower as Dean left the room and gathered the things he’d need for his morning classes, including his Charms book so he could try to find what he was looking for while he waited for Harry.

____________

Blaise Zabini was still smirking as he entered the Slytherin common room. The smirk was enough out of character for him that those still there took note and wondered what had him in such a good mood.

He went straight to the bookshelves and found the book he wanted on memory charms, retrieved quill, ink and parchment and set to work researching the Obliviate charm so he could both have a little fun and, hopefully, get someone to perform it on him so he could forget what he’d seen. By the time he had found the charm and written down what he needed to know and practised the wand movements, it was long past curfew so he put his things away and went to bed, hoping he’d be able to sleep instead picturing the scene he had stumbled upon earlier.

Blaise woke from a nightmare, having pictured  the atrocity that had been performed just up the corridor from the entrance to the Slytherin common room. It had played over and over again in his head before he had woken. Instead of showering, he performed a simple scourgify knowing that rising so early would alert the others to something out of the ordinary in his life. After performing the spell, he rolled over and went back to sleep with a smile, despite his nightmare, since he’d found the spell he needed. Now, he just needed to practice it before performing it on Thomas.

It took two weeks of daily practice for Zabini to get the wand movement right to perform the Obliviate, and another couple of days to get the emphasis in the right places when saying the spell, but he was finally ready. He knew Thomas wouldn’t know what hit him, and he was content to sit back and watch the show as a Gryffindork forgot things he should know, things which should be ingrained by now. He could just picture the look of confusion at what was going on, since his target would most certainly  **not** remember what they’d seen, who had cast the obliviate, or one or two other things Blaise was planning on making the other boy forget.

He and Dean met in a different dungeon classroom that Friday night after dinner. Dean was standing across the teacher’s desk from Blaise, wondering exactly why the dark-skinned Slytherin was smirking when he’d been just as horrified at what they’d seen as he had been. The longer Blaise took to raise his wand; the more Dean wondered if putting himself on the receiving end of a spell from a Slytherin was such a brilliant idea.

They both startled as the door slammed open, “Just WHAT are the two of you doing?” Professor Snape demanded.

“Uhh...uhhhh,” Dean stammered as Blaise gave a simple ‘nothing professor’, but he couldn’t quite wipe the smirk off his face.

“Nothing indeed Mr Zabini. Your wand was pointing at Mr Thomas. Therefore, you were planning on something.” He glared at the Gryffindor. “What are you doing at the point of Mr Zabini’s wand, Mr Thomas?”

“W...w...well, you see professor, w...w...we saw s...something we wanted to forget, so he was going to make me forget it,” he stammered nervously.

“And you, a Gryffindor, are going to trust a Slytherin to perform an Obliviate, a spell which is beyond NEWT level, and which a 6th year has never performed, on you and expect him only to make you forget what you saw?”

“Well,” Dean began, but he never got to finish his sentence.

“Twenty points from Gryffindor for sheer stupidity, and go see your Head of House about what you saw. She’ll be able to help you.”

“And Mr Thomas?” He continued as Dean got to the door, “they were practising for a play they will be putting on this summer. There was nothing untoward or dangerous happening.” The 6th year Gryffindor nearly crumpled to the floor in relief but remembered who was in the room with him and ran out, relieved that what he’d seen hadn’t been what he’d thought and that he was saved from what he was now positive wasn’t such a great idea.

“As for you,” Snape continued once the other boy was out of the room. He waved his wand, and the door closed. Another wave and a silencing spell went up. “You KNOW better than to point your wand at someone, no matter what house they are in! Fifty points from Slytherin for stupidity above and beyond the norm, and a week’s detention with me starting right now.”

The professor lowered the silencing spell and marched Blaise to the potions classroom where he had the honour of cleaning cauldrons without magic. To make matters worse, they were all first-year cauldrons so they had clumps and glops which were extra stuck on. Blaise groaned. He doubted Thomas was getting this much heat — McGonagall was an angel compared to Snape.  

Dean headed for Gryffindor Tower, intending to head straight to his dorm and give himself a stern talking to, but his Head of House was standing beside the portrait waiting for him. His shoulders slumped, and he followed Professor McGonagall to her office where she lectured him about not coming to her for something he thought was so serious. On top of the lecture, she set him an 18-inch essay on the duties of the student and the duties of his professors and how the two should interact.

Dean shuffled back to his dorm, thinking about the punishment Zabini might have received. Snape always went easy on the Slytherins — he doubted it was as bad as the essay.

**Author's Note:**

> It took me a while to be able to write this. I just couldn't picture the two of them interacting. Then my Plunny woman answered the call, and we got this!  
> I did enjoy the challenge. I hope you enjoyed the story.


End file.
